In the production of toothed articles, particularly gears such as spur and helical gears, it is widely known to utilize a hob comprising a single thread or multiple threads spirally arranged about the circumference of the hob. Each thread includes multiple gashes to form a plurality of cutting teeth along the length of the spirally arranged thread. Hobs of this type are shown, for example, in the Gleason company brochure “Cutting Tools for Cylindrical Gears”, May, 2004.
In many instances, such as low quantity production runs or job shop environments, the cost of a conventional hob may not be justified. While cutting tools have been disclosed (for example by Novkov in U.S. Pat. No. 3,036,363; Pinkowski in U.S. Pat. No. 3,303,556; or, Jilbert in U.S. Pat. No. 3,859,700) which include one or more cutting blades inserted in a cutter head, such inserted-blade cutting tools are for face milling applications and are unsuitable for hob-type generation of tooth profiles necessary for cutting gears.